Coin fed lid



B EDWARDS May 23, 1967 COIN FED LID Filed July 28, 1965 INVENTOR.

SW00! Eda ards United States Patent Ofiiice 3,323.,lh4 Patented May 23, 1967 3,321,104 CUEN FED lLliD Bryant Edwards, Clarendon Hills, ilk, assignor to Illinois Tool Works inc, tChicago, ill., a corporation of Delaware Filed July 28, 1965, Ser. No. 475,4d5 7 Claims. (63]. 220-97) ABSTRACT 0 F THE Dli CLfiSURlE A stackable non-nesting one-piece thermoplastic closure for use with the open mouth of a complementary container body and having means incorporated therein permitting unimpeded sliding removal of individual lids from a stack of lids.

Equipment for filling open mouthed containers and then for capping the same has increased the production capabilities of food processors and the like, With such equipment, it is customary, due to space requirements, to arrange lids or closure members in a vertical stack from which they are subsequently removed for capping on open mouthed containers. Individual lids are separated from the stack, usually from the bottom thereof, in timed or synchronous relationship with the container filling operations for movement to a container-lid assembly station where the capping operation takes place.

When lids are placed in a vertical stack, consideration must be given to lid stacking and dispensing or feeding aspects. Lids of the nestable variety are easily stacked, but it will be appreciated that partial telescoping of nestable lids creates dimculties in lid separation which is necessary for lid dispensing, Non-nestable lid-s with which the present invention is concerned, and which are commonly referred to as overcaps or flush type lids, can also be made to stack one atop the other in the tie sired manner, and although they can be dispensed or fed from the stack with much greater facility than nestable lids, sliding removal of such lids from each other without impeding the movement thereof is not always possible. The difficulty that has been encountered is that portions of adjacent lids in the stack become partially nested or interlocked both during lid stacking and as they are dispensed.

There have been several recent approaches which indicate that solutions are being sought for coin feeding of the lids. The proposals advanced have, however, cre- I ated additional complicating factors from both a manufacturing and use standpoint which have generally been avoided by the present invention.

In accordance with the principles of the present invention, there is provided a thermoplastic lid or closure member with a peripherally extending skirt and a circumferentially extending groove means which is so configured, positioned and dimensioned relative to the pe ripher-aliy extending skirt portion that it permits uninterrupted sliding removal of adjacent stacked lids from each other as will become more apparent from the specific description of the invention that is to follow.

It is an object of the present invention to provide a new and improved stackable, nonnesting thermoplastic lid or closure member adapted for sliding removal or coin feeding from a stack of similarly configured lids.

Another object of the present invention is the provision of a stackable, non-nesting lid or closure member of the above described type which permits unimpeded removal of adjacent stacked lids from each other without partial nesting or other entanglements.

Yet another obiect of the present invention is the provision of a stackable, non-nestable lid of the aforementioned type which can be formed in a single operation by conventional thermo-forming techniques without complex tools or complicated procedures.

Still another object of the present invention is to provide a stackable, non-nestable lid of the above described type which may incorporate features in certain embodiments thereof facilitating engagement and removal of the lid from a complementary container.

Other and further objects and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description when taken in connection with the accompanying drawing wherein:

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the novel container lid or closure member which incorporates the principles of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a fragmentary side elevational view, partially in section, of the container lid or closure member shown in FIG. 1 when assembled to a complementary container;

FIG. 3 is a sectional view of a plurality of stacked lids showing the manner in which the lids can be separated from each other by sliding removal of the lowermost lid from the remainder of stacked lids;

FIG. 4 is a side elevational view, partially in section, of a modified form of container lid or closure member coming within the purview of the present invention; and

FIG. 5 is also a side elevational view, partially in section, showing yet one other modified form of container lid or closure member as invisioned by the present invention.

The container lids or closure members of the present invention are preferably made from thermoplastic material such as polyethylene, polystyrene or the like because they can be produced as economically as their paper or wax impregnated paper counterparts while additionally possessing many other advantages thereover. Some of these advantages include increased flexibility enabling the lid to accommodate itself to out of shape container rims, the reusability of thermoplastic lids as compared with their paper counterparts, the substantially moisture vapor barrier provided by thermoplastic lids, and other such factors. In the discussion that is to follow, the lid or closure member will be referred to as being of the thermoplastic variety, but it will be understood that other materials may be employed either separately or combined in some manner with thermoplastic materials.

Referring now to the drawing and first to the form of the invention shown in FIGS. 1-3, there will be seen a thermoplastic closure or lid member which is generally designated by the numeral lit. The closure is adapted to be positioned over the open mouth of a container having a complementary configured rim portion, the container itself having any desired configuration and being made from any suitable material. In FIG. 2 of the drawing, it will be noted that the container 12 has a rim or lip portion 14 which conforms to the closure member 10 as will be further explained below.

The closure 10 is provided with a horizontally extending, generally planar covering or top wall 16 which is adapted to overlie the open mouth of the container 12 adjacent the lip or rim portion 14 thereof. Extending downwardly from the periphery of the covering of top wall 16 is a depending skirt portion 18 which projects a suitable distance below the covering or top wall 16 in order to accommodate the lip or rim portion 14 of the container. At the outer free extremity of the depending skirt portion 18, there is formed a reversely extending flexible finger portion 20 which serves a two fold purpose. When associated with the container 12, it is designed to engage the curled lip or rim portion 14 on the underside thereof in the manner shown in FIG. 2 to prevent inadvertent removal of the closure from the container. Because the lid 16 is made of a thermoplastic material, the flexible finger portion 20 is designed to flex radially outwardly or snap over the curled lip or rim portion 14 until it is moved into underlying engagement with respect thereto. The second function of the flexible finger por tion 20 is that it serves as a stacking abutment in a manner to be described in detail below.

The closure member is also provided with a circumferentially extending groove 22 which is spaced downwardly from the covering wall 16 and radially inwardly of the depending skirt portion 18. The circumferentially extending groove 22 is defined, in the FIGS. 1-3 embodiment, by a pair of concentrically arranged peripherally continuous side walls designated 24, 26 which extend in an axial direction away from the covering wall 12, and which are integrally joined to each other by the bottom wall portion 28. It is to be noted that the outermost side wall portion 24 cooperates with the depending skirt portion 18 and that portion of the covering wall 16 intermediate the depending skirt portion 18 and the outermost side wall portion 24 in engaging the lip or rim portion of the container 12 at a plurality of discrete, spaced apart locations for sealing purposes. It will be recognized, however, that the number and location of the lid and container rim engagements will vary depending upon the particulars desired.

In the FIGS. 1-3 embodiment, the circumferentially extending groove 22 cooperates with the depending skirt portion 18 and its peripherally extending finger portion in providing a stackable lid capable of being easily removed in a sliding fashion from a stack of similarly configured lids which has become necessary due to developments in high speed capping and other lid dispensing equipment. It is first of all to be noted that the flexible finger portion 20 at the outer terminus of the depending skirt portion 18 extends downwardly at least as far as, and preferable slightly below the bottom wall portion 28 of the groove 22. In this manner, the lower surface of the flexible finger 20 will rest upon and be supported by the covering wall 16 of a similarly configured subjacent closure in the vicinity of the depending skirt portion 18 thereof. The distance the flexible finger portion 20 preferably extends beneath the plane of the bottom wall por tion 28 in each closure is only to the degree necessary to permit stacking of adjacent closures without interrupting the function of the groove 22 and associated walls thereof in preventing partial nesting of adjacent closures upon sliding removal thereof.

In accordance with an important feature of the present invention, the internal dimension of the groove 22 in the vicinity of the plane of covering wall 16 which is designated A in FIG. 3 of the drawing is .less than the external dimension of the groove 22 in the vicinity or area of the bottom wall portion 23 which is designated B. Since the internal dimension A is less than the external dimension B, providing a first restricted throat area smaller than the bottom wall portion or surface 28, adjacent stacked lids when vertically aligned with each other as seen, for example by the two uppermost lids in FIG. 3 of the drawing, cannot interfere or partially nest within the other. As a further important feature of the present invention, the distance or dimension between the flexible finger portion 20 and the bottom wall portion 28 of the groove 22 which is identified C in FIG. 3 is less than the dimension D of the covering wall 16 intermediate the depending skirt portion 18 and the outermost side wall portion 24, providing a second restricted throat area smaller than the upper wall surface of the covering wall 16 determined by the dimension D, to maintain the non-nesting relationship. Moreover, the dimension C is greater than the dimension A so that there will be no possibility of partial nesting between adjacent lids during removal as will now be explained.

When removing the bottommost lid from a stack of lids as indicated diagrammatically by the arrow in FIG. 3 of the drawing, there will be no tilting or misalignment of the lid being removed with respect to the other lids of the stack due to the location of the circumferential groove 22 with respect to the covering wall 16 and the depending skirt portion 18. More particulraly, it will be seen that there will be no nesting, either partial or otherwise, of adjacent stacked lids which are vertically aligned due to the fact that the open dimensions of the closures, namely A and C are less than the closed dimensions or portions B and D respectively. As the bottommost lid is moved to the left as viewed in FIG. 3 of the drawing, the bottom wall portion 28 of the penultimate lid will engage in a sliding fashion the covering or top wall 16 of the bottommost lid, and since the groove 22 as Well as its bottom wall portion 28 is circumferentially continuous, this established relationship will continue until the bottommost lid is stripped away from the remainder of the stack. In other words, since the dimension B'of the penultimate lid and the dimension D of the bottommost lid are greater than the dimension A of the bottommost lid and dimension C of the penultimate lid, there will be no interfitting or partial nesting of the closures. Sliding removal or coin feeding of stackable, non-nesting lids or closure members is therefore permitted by this simple construction. There is no need for struts or the like across open portions of the closures which although they aid in coin feeding, reduce the flexibility of the lid and complicate manufacturing procedures.

The flexible finger portion 2% is preferable peripherally continuous as in the FIGS. 1-3 embodiment, but it is possible, and in some cases may even be desirable, to periodically interrupt the finger portion. This is shown in the lid 10a in FIG. 4 wherein the same numerals are employed with the suffix a to indicate like parts. In the lid 10a, the interruptions are the indents 30 which may not only provide a constrictive closure rim, but may be easier to form than the reversely extending finger portion 20. The indents 3t) may be of any desired shape and spacing around the periphery of the depending skirt portion 18.

The arrangement shown in FIG. 5 of the drawing is also a modified form of the invention as indicated by the application of identical numerals with the suffix b added. In this embodiment, the side wall portions 24 and 26 taper upwardly and inwardly from the bottom wall portion 28 toward the covering wall 16. This particular arrangement will increase the differences from a measurement standpoint between the dimensions A and B, and C and D respectively. Additionally, the side wall portions 24, 26 will enable fingers or a tool to obtain a leverage advantage in stripping or removing the closure from its associated container. In this last embodiment, the area in the vicinity of the juncture between the side wall portion 24 and the bottom wall portion 28 performs the function of the flexible finger portion 20 or the indents 3t? in the FIGS. l3 and FIG. 4 embodiments, and thus the reversely bent portion is not necessary if the container is designed to permit a friction fit of a lid on the interior of a container 12b as seen in FIG. 5 of the drawing. Thus, the outer extremity of the depending skirt portion 18, while still performing the function of a stacking abutment, need not be used as a rim or lip engaging portion.

Although specific embodiments have been shown and described, it is with full awareness that many modifications thereof are possible. The invention, therefore, is not to be restricted except so far as is necessitated by the appended claims.

I claim:

1. A stackable non-nesting one-piece thermoplastic closure comprising, a covering wall for the open mouth of a complementary container, a depending skirt portion extending downwardly from the periphery of said covering wall and terminating at its lower end in a stacking abutment adapted to support said closure in stacked relationship upon the covering wall of a similarly configured closure, and circumferentially extending groove means disposed radially inwardly of said depending skirt portion with the bottom wall surface thereof generally aligned with said stacking abutment, the internal dimension of said groove means in the vicinity of the plane of said covering wall being less than the external dimension of said groove means in the area of its bottom wall to present a restricted throat at the upper end of said groove means smaller than said bottom wall surface, and the distance between said stacking abutment and the bottom wall surface in said groove means being less than the upper wall surface of said covering wall intermediate said depending skirt portion and said groove means to present a second restricted throat between said stacking abutment and bottom wall surface which is smaller than said upper wall surface whereby to permit sliding removal of adjacent stacked closures from each other without tilting thereof.

2. The closure as set forth in claim 1 wherein said stacking abutment comprises a radially inwardly directed shoulder contiguous to the lower end of said depending skirt portion.

3. The closure as set forth in claim 1 wherein said stacking abutment comprises the outwardly extending lower end face of said depending skirt portion which extends substantially normal to the axis of said closure.

4. The closure as set forth in claim 1 wherein said stacking abutment extends slightly below the bottom wall surface of said circumferentially extending groove means to space said bottom wall surface from the covering wall of a subjacent similarly configured closure.

5. The closure as set forth in claim 1 wherein the side wall portions of said circumferentially extending groove means are inwardly and upwardly inclined relative to the bottom wall portion thereof.

6. The lid as defined in claim 2 wherein said inwardly directed shoulder comprises a reversely bent flexible finger portion at least laterally inwardly offset of said depending skirt portion.

7. The lid as set forth in claim 6 wherein said inwardly directed shoulder is interrupted at a plurality of spaced apart locations.

References Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,002,458 5/ 1935 Sebell 220-42 3,122,264 2/ 1964 Davis 229-43 X 3,179,283 4/ 1965 Amberg 220-97 X References Cited by the Applicant UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,047,720 7/ 1936 Wilhelm. 3,237,800 3/1966 Edwards.

THERON E. CONDON, Primary Examiner.

GEORGE E. LOWRANCE, Examiner. 

1. A STACKABLE NON-NESTING ONE-PIECE THERMOPLASTIC CLOSURE COMPRISING, A COVERING WALL FOR THE OPEN MOUTH OF A COMPLEMENTARY CONTAINER, A DEPENDING SKIRT PORTION EXTENDING DOWNWARDLY FROM THE PERIPHERY OF SAID COVERING WALL AND TERMINATING AT ITS LOWER END IN A STACKING ABUTMENT ADAPTED TO SUPPORT SAID CLOSURE IN STACKED RELATIONSHIP UPON THE COVERING WALL OF A SIMILARLY CONFIGURED CLOSURE, AND CIRCUMFERENTIALLY EXTENDING GROOVE MEANS DISPOSED RADIALLY INWARDLY OF SAID DEPENDING SKIRT PORTION WITH THE BOTTOM WALL SURFACE THEREOF GENERALLY ALIGNED WITH SAID STACKING ABUTMENT, THE INTERNAL DIMENSION OF SAID GROOVE MEANS IN THE VICINITY OF THE PLANE OF SAID COVERING WALL BEING LESS THAN THE EXTERNAL DIMENSION OF SAID GROOVE MEANS IN THE AREA OF ITS BOTTOM WALL TO PRESENT A RESTRICTED THROAT AT THE UPPER END OF SAID GROOVE MEANS SMALLER THAN SAID BOTTOM WALL SURFACE, AND THE DISTANCE BETWEEN SAID STACKING ABUTMENT AND THE BOTTOM WALL SURFACE IN SAID GROOVE MEANS BEING LESS THAN THE UPPER WALL SURFACE OF SAID COVERING WALL INTERMEDIATE SAID DEPENDING SKIRT PORTION AND SAID GROOVE MEANS TO PRESENT A SECOND RESTRICTED THROAT BETWEEN SAID STACKING ABUTMENT AND BOTTOM WALL SURFACE WHICH IS SMALLER THAN SAID UPPER WALL SURFACE WHEREBY TO PERMIT SLIDING REMOVAL OF ADJACENT STACKED CLOSURES FROM EACH OTHER WITHOUT TILTING THEREOF. 